http://www.fromallangles.com/newspapers/country/india/tehelka.com.htm
WHAT 'S RIGHT ABOUT INDIA
POACHERS ON THE RUN
Kaziranga National Park's anti-poaching philosophy is the biggest
conservation success story of the century, write Nitin A. Gokhale and
Samudra Gupta Kashyap
Other Articles of the Series
PART I
Kaziranga's pride
PART II
Tiger, tiger burning bright
PART III
Poachers on the run
Tourists and normal visitors apart, Kaziranga National Park also
attracts another category of people whose number may not be very high
but are nevertheless dangerous for the inmates, particularly the
rhino. Yes, they are the poachers or illegal hunters who want to kill
the rhino and take away its horn which apparently fetches a high
premium in the international market.
If game hunters nearly decimated the rhino in the early 20th century
before Kaziranga was declared a reserved forest, the latter day
hunters remain the greatest threat to the rhino. These poachers not
only shoot but adopt other means to kill the animal to get hold of
its horn which supposedly possesses aphrodisiac properties and
therefore brings up to $50,000 per kg in certain countries of Asia
and Europe. The average weight of the Indian rhino's horn is about
750 gm.
Human Instinct: dedicated forest guards in Kaziranga stake their
lives to protect precious wildlife
The first attempt to stop rhino killings were made during the late
1930's under the leadership of Arthur John Wallace Milroy and Mahi
Chandra Miri. While Kaziranga was declared a game sanctuary in
November 1916, it was not until 1938 that hunting was stopped at the
instance of Milroy, who was then the conservator of forests in Assam.
Milroy was also responsible for throwing the sanctuary open to
tourists the same year, thus initiating a new chapter in Kaziranga's
history. Milroy, who made a big name for himself as a conservationist
was a true forest man. As Chris Wemmer, in a tribute called Milroy:
the Gaonburra Sahib, says, "Milroy is a rare breed of forest officer
who could be called a complete forester. He was responsible for
initiating legislative measures for protection of the Great Indian
One-horned Rhinoceros and setting up many game sanctuaries in Assam
in the beginning of the 20th century."
Later PD Stracey, who went on to become chief conservator of forests,
took off from where Milroy had left and speeded up the anti-poaching
campaign to protect the rhinos after World War II. Stracey is also
remembered for having changed Kaziranga's status from a 'game
sanctuary' to a 'wildlife sanctuary' in 1950 because the word 'game'
connotated animals for hunting. Gradually, the protection of
Kaziranga became a kind of missionary zeal for successive forest
officers. The entire administrative pattern for the protection of the
sanctuary was thus re-organised with anti-poaching measures becoming
the main focus.
Poachers have been found to adopt four different methods to kill the
rhino for its horn. The most popular method used to be known as the
traditional 'pit-trap' technique in which they would dig a pit of
roughly 2 metres by 1.5 metres size which was deep enough to hold an
adult rhino without providing it any space to even wriggle out of it.
This pit used to be then covered with grass and thatch while some
even put sharpened bamboo poles below the grass so that the rhino
would get injured and therefore would be unable to make any attempt
to come out of the hole. This pit is normally dug on the dandi - the
same pathway that rhinos habitually take - and once a rhino falls
into this trap, the poachers come out of hiding and cop off the horn,
leaving the rhino to bleed to death.
Interestingly, the rhino horn is not actually a 'horn' as one would
think. As Durga Prasad Neog, a veteran forest official, who set in
motion many of the procedures that made Kaziranga into a world famous
national park, told these writers: "A rhino horn, unlike many other
animals, is not really a horn but is a mass of several thousand
agglutinated hair and their epidermis which becomes a horn-like
structure because of the combined effect of sweat and other exudation
from the rhino's snout comprising mostly of keratin tissues.
It is actually an external appendage to the rhino's body and a
reasonably strong blow can dismantle it."
The death-by-pit method that had once almost gone out of fashion has
gradually made a comeback in Kaziranga. Although gun shot method is
faster and can be carried out by a small team, the ever-alert
Kaziranga staff has become almost omnipresent and can give hot chase
to the poachers to dig the pit and wait for the kill. Indeed, the
number of animals, including tigers, has gone up considerably,
thereby making it riskier than before for several men to venture deep
into the park.
While three other methods - electrocution, poisoning and snaring -
have been reported from other rhino habitats in Assam, poachers who
target Kaziranga most commonly use firearms to kill the rhino. Hired
gunmen, accompanied by guides from surrounding villages, are the most
common unwelcome visitors to the park.
Dharanidhar Boro, who has killed at least 37 poachers and has
captured over 100 of them since he joined Kaziranga National Park in
1987 as a ranger. He has fascinating insights into the way this
network operates. Boro, who has won several prestigious international
awards for his services to Kaziranga, says: "These men are engaged by
operatives who have well-developed links to international gangs of
smugglers. One such gang, whose origins we tracked in July 2004, is
based in Phuntsholing in Bhutan and is known to have links in China.
There are other groups which operate from Nagaland and smuggle out
the horns through Manipur and Myanmar into different South-East Asian
countries."
Dharanidhar Boro has killed 37 poachers and has captured over 100 of
them since he joined the park in 1987 as a ranger
Looking at our notes of 1996, we came across a detailed description
given to us by Bishan Singh Bonal about the modus operandi adopted by
the poachers and also the way he tackled the menace. Between 1990 and
1995, as many as 167 rhinos had fallen prey to the poachers, but at
the same time Bonal and his staff managed to kill at least 36
culprits. "These poachers used to operate in a gang of five or six
people. While normally only two of them carried weapons, others come
as helpers to remove the horn once a rhino is killed or trapped. They
also bring a villager from the fringes of the park as a guide. In
most cases, these people do not even get to know for whom they are
working. For the amount of risks that they take to enter the park and
kill a rhino, they are poorly paid," he said.
Bonal had that time pointed out how poachers had changed their
timings, choosing to strike when the guards would be resting in the
day after having kept a night-long vigil. "Having got the wind of
change in their methods and timings, we too changed our strategy and
succeeded in gunning down over three dozen poachers in five years,"
Bonal told us.
Later in his book, Bonal reveals why he adopted the strategy of
striking back. "We were guided by the strategy of the late Sanjay
Debroy, who was a keen advocate of the 'kill or get killed'
approach." Debroy, then the chief conservator of forest in Assam, and
later the Additional Inspector General of Wildlife in the government
of India, was a legendary conservationist. Valmik Thapar, well-known
tiger expert, best describes him in an obituary after his death in
1999: "Debroy was one of the finest forest officers. Blunt, honest,
tough talking and severe in his criticism, his interventions for the
cause of wildlife can never be forgotten by anyone. He was recognised
frequently for his service to wildlife and received the National
Award for Management of Manas Tiger Reserve in 1982. He also received
the internationally-prestigious Norman Borlaug Award for his
outstanding contribution to the protection of flora and fauna in
Assam."
Excerpted from Kaziranga - the rhino century by Nitin A. Gokhale &
Samudra G. Kashyap
June 18 , 2005
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